I did not say they invalidated your hypothesis. I said they do not appear to confirm it.
I don't actually trust PFF pressure numbers, because I've seen the way they assign "hurries" to defensive players and I don't think that matches reality. Assuming symmetrical grading, then the issues would arise with QBs as well.
Also, I think reading this post in tandem with the previous one provides a more complete picture.
I was curious, however, about your point regarding how many make-able throws he might have missed last year. There indeed were many marked under/overthrows in last year's FO game charting data. Again, I think I covered that in the last post showing the frequent let's say "near miss" nature of many of his long 2013 completions, but it would be an interesting end-of-year comparison.

Earlier this week I posted a series of screenshots that implied -- to me at least -- that Foles' superlative deep passing stats in 2013 might not have matched his "true" ability in that regard. It was one of those moments when "watching the video" > "looking at stats." To perform a similar exerc...

Take these stats with a grain of salt, but PFF says Foles was under pressure on 34.3% of dropbacks last year (17th) and has been under pressure on 32.2% of dropbacks this year (15th). That doesn't appear to confirm your point.

Earlier this week I posted a series of screenshots that implied -- to me at least -- that Foles' superlative deep passing stats in 2013 might not have matched his "true" ability in that regard. It was one of those moments when "watching the video" > "looking at stats." To perform a similar exerc...

Earlier this week I posted a series of screenshots that implied -- to me at least -- that Foles' superlative deep passing stats in 2013 might not have matched his "true" ability in that regard. It was one of those moments when "watching the video" > "looking at stats." To perform a similar exerc...

Williams is an adequate cover corner. That's harder to find than an adequate safety.
I think Boykin starting outside and playing inside on nickel downs is better than Williams starting outside and Boykin still playing inside on nickel downs, but we'll see.

Now that Kelly has officially named Vick the starting quarterback, it's worth spending a couple minutes thinking about one of this preseason's biggest mysteries: Why have the Vick and Foles offenses looked so different? Vick, for the most part, has been handing off or standing in the pocket and ...

I don't really get the idea that Kelly's offense is all that complex from the quarterback's side of things. If it's five-on-five inside, hand off. If you have two-on-two outside, throw the screen. If the linebacker jumps this thing, do that thing instead.
Blitz pickup also become simpler just by virtue of the spread. There aren't as many ways you can bring pressure when you have fewer guys inside on defense.
Given time, Vick can read coverages. Where he struggles is sensing and responding to pressure, which to some extent messes up every quarterback. With a much stronger line and a scheme that slows down the pass rush, he should be in a position to play very well this year.
And I'm not saying it hasn't happened -- it definitely has -- but it's been awhile since Vick made a decision as bad as that red zone pick Foles threw last week.

Sheil has another good, albeit (ahem) GIF-free, no-22 look at the new Eagles offense today. One of the things that really comes through in those pictures is how trivial a problem the math issues outside are. On the screen to Damaris, if that DB in the slot sticks with him rather than blitzing, ...

You probably still remember the second-quarter run play where Mychal Kendricks (!) and Nate Allen (!!!) both blasted through the line of scrimmage to drop DeAngelo Williams in the backfield for a loss. One thing that jumped out is how similar it looked to a play against the Patriots that reall...

You probably still remember the second-quarter run play where Mychal Kendricks (!) and Nate Allen (!!!) both blasted through the line of scrimmage to drop DeAngelo Williams in the backfield for a loss. One thing that jumped out is how similar it looked to a play against the Patriots that reall...

If I may, I think you guys are watching the wrong thing. Look again, our linemen didn't get off their blocks and make plays in either video. The difference is that in the Pats play, the second-level guys -- especially Nate Allen -- chopped their feet and "caught" the blockers, while against the Panthers they diagnosed immediately and bolted through to make the play.
Nate Allen is by far the best example of the discussions/argument/befuddlement we've been living through the past couple years. Aren't these guys NFL players? Haven't some of them looked good before? Why do they seem so terrible at playing football?
If the answer is "they suck, get over it," then fine, no amount of new coaching involving Chip's innovative new methods is going to make a difference. But if the truth is somewhere closer to "they're not All-Pros, but the defensive coaching has been legitimately terrible for years," then what we should expect to start seeing is guys making mistakes one week, but then *correcting them as they go forward.*
Our defensive problems are a long way from solved. You don't fix years of mess in a week. (The coverages look particularly disastrous.) But we're looking for trendlines.

You probably still remember the second-quarter run play where Mychal Kendricks (!) and Nate Allen (!!!) both blasted through the line of scrimmage to drop DeAngelo Williams in the backfield for a loss. One thing that jumped out is how similar it looked to a play against the Patriots that reall...

Except shorter cornerbacks aren't that rare. Of the 71-player sample, 27 are 5-10 or less and 44 are 5-11 or more.
Really it's the other way. If you're 6-2 *and* you have the change of direction ability of a 5-10 guy, then you're the one who's pretty exceptional (or you just can't catch :-).
We're also not trying to prove that shorter cornerbacks are better. We're just trying to disprove the notion that being 5-9 and 44/100ths means you're too short to succeed in the NFL. That's clearly not the case.

... you best have something better to talk about than his height. If it's a day ending in 'Y' someone out there is telling us in the newspaper, on twitter or over the radio that the almost-5-10 Brandon Boykin is simply too small to play cornerback outside, where literally every team has multiple...

... you best have something better to talk about than his height. If it's a day ending in 'Y' someone out there is telling us in the newspaper, on twitter or over the radio that the almost-5-10 Brandon Boykin is simply too small to play cornerback outside, where literally every team has multiple...

I think DRC's issue inside is technique. Outside, he can use his catch-up speed to make up for any mistakes / laziness. Inside, the ball's on you as the guy comes out of his break. There's no catch-up time.

... you best have something better to talk about than his height. If it's a day ending in 'Y' someone out there is telling us in the newspaper, on twitter or over the radio that the almost-5-10 Brandon Boykin is simply too small to play cornerback outside, where literally every team has multiple...

I limited the sample to guys who played at least 50 percent of their team's snaps. That gave us 71 CBs, which as a starting point is close to the 32 x 2 = 64 number of starters leaguewide.
So we're not talking about dedicated nickel players who only play in the slot. Even Boykin didn't have enough snaps to make the list.
Where this gets even a little trickier is that you have guys like Antoine Winfield, who, at this point in his career, is a starter outside in the base defense but then moves into the slot when they go nickel. (Which is how I'd use Boykin as well.) He's a nice example from my side of the argument, because his YPAs inside and outside are almost identical and teams actually threw at him a _lot_ more when he was inside than out.
That's actually mostly the case for all four sub-5-10 guys in the database who played starter-level snaps but also spent a lot of time inside: Captain Munnerlyn (6.1 inside vs 6.2 outside), Javier Arenas (7.8 vs 8.7), Robert McLain (5.1 vs. 4.5).
As a group, these short guys were 6.3 inside and 6.7 outside. The _taller_ guys had a much more pronounced split, at 7.0 vs. 8.9.
And keep in mind too that if the concern is truly "short guy matched up against big guy," offenses can force that issue by moving a guy like Nicks into the slot. (Fitz and Megatron usually have dedicated coverage plans that don't let those kinds of cross-matches happen.)

... you best have something better to talk about than his height. If it's a day ending in 'Y' someone out there is telling us in the newspaper, on twitter or over the radio that the almost-5-10 Brandon Boykin is simply too small to play cornerback outside, where literally every team has multiple...

The day the Eagles hired Chip Kelly was the day my reading about the spread offense went from "everything Chris Brown writes" to "everything I could get my hands on." One of the amazing things about hiring Chip Kelly, at this moment in time, is just how much analysis has been done on his method...

The day the Eagles hired Chip Kelly was the day my reading about the spread offense went from "everything Chris Brown writes" to "everything I could get my hands on." One of the amazing things about hiring Chip Kelly, at this moment in time, is just how much analysis has been done on his method...

No, the implication is that turning it into a read won't be a huge jump. But as noted a couple times above, the QBs were just handing off.
Apologies for the Ducks fan guess. But then as an Eagles fan, you know Foles wasn't running anywhere on purpose last year :)

The day the Eagles hired Chip Kelly was the day my reading about the spread offense went from "everything Chris Brown writes" to "everything I could get my hands on." One of the amazing things about hiring Chip Kelly, at this moment in time, is just how much analysis has been done on his method...

The "read" in the read option before the handoff is the quarterback's.
The "read" after the handoff is the running back looking at the blocking and determining which hole to hit. The aiming point might be inside (outside) but because of the way the defense overplayed or just came off the ball, he might end up running outside (inside).
https://www.google.com/search?q=running+back+reads+his+block
John, you sound like an Oregon fan. If that's true, understand that the plays above are Andy Reid plays. They're not Chip Kelly plays. So to say "bad read by the QB" would be true IF the play had actually been a read. Last year, it wasn't.
As an Oregon fan, you probably also don't know that play #5 is demonstrating the sterling efforts of our backup-backup-LT and backup-C. They were assuredly coached to do something differently :)
One of the reasons we're all so excited about Kelly's new staff is that young player development has been pretty terrible around here the last couple years. We're hopeful that his emphasis on innovative teaching approaches can change that.
Thanks for the comments.

The day the Eagles hired Chip Kelly was the day my reading about the spread offense went from "everything Chris Brown writes" to "everything I could get my hands on." One of the amazing things about hiring Chip Kelly, at this moment in time, is just how much analysis has been done on his method...

The running back alignment tell is something that even Chip Kelly doesn't do all the time anymore. Those videos were created earlier in his tenure, before he evolved his offense.
Everyone's zone game is a little different. Mudd isn't exactly the same as Gibbs isn't exactly the same as Kelly.
And yeah, it's inherently difficult to say after the fact exactly what was called sometimes, just based on the way the running back reads things.
I think the core point here is that for all the talk -- and reality -- of a new offense, some of the basic run game concepts are pretty similar. So there's every reason to believe that if, say, Evan Mathis was really effective in one scheme, he'll continue to be in this one.

The day the Eagles hired Chip Kelly was the day my reading about the spread offense went from "everything Chris Brown writes" to "everything I could get my hands on." One of the amazing things about hiring Chip Kelly, at this moment in time, is just how much analysis has been done on his method...

The day the Eagles hired Chip Kelly was the day my reading about the spread offense went from "everything Chris Brown writes" to "everything I could get my hands on." One of the amazing things about hiring Chip Kelly, at this moment in time, is just how much analysis has been done on his method...

I think what's happening there is that the slant messed up the pre-snap count. What looked like one front changed into another and they didn't adjust on the fly.
Washington had seen a lot of OZs at that point and I'm guessing our linemen had gotten used to them running wide with us.

The day the Eagles hired Chip Kelly was the day my reading about the spread offense went from "everything Chris Brown writes" to "everything I could get my hands on." One of the amazing things about hiring Chip Kelly, at this moment in time, is just how much analysis has been done on his method...

On Monday morning, I made an offer. The first person to chip in $100 for the Eagles Almanac kickstarter got to name his or her post here on the IgglesBlog. Twitter-er @Thunder_Lips -- who probably isn't actually Hulk Hogan -- is your winner. And since he's such a nice guy,... Continue reading

This is correct. We're talking about small sample sizes, so the buckets you pick can have a large effect on how the numbers look. I just wanted to show that in Graham's case it doesn't really matter how you slice them, he was consistently productive in every role.

As we move into free agency and the draft, a lot of assumptions are being made about the kind of scheme the Eagles are going to run on defense next year. Assumptions that aren't really supportable if we go back and look at Chip Kelly's introductory press conference: That's one of the things abo...

To our lasting regret, no one ever wrote the book on Andy Reid. It's not that no one ever tried to write a book about the Andy Reid Eagles. I'm sure it was pitched dozens of times. Clearly, no one ever got a yes. We can only guess as to why, but I'll always blame it on the Super Bowl.* A book...

You're conflating two different types of reads here. Vick's blitz recognition is abysmal, he can't see dropping linebackers, etc., etc. That's all taken as read.
But when you look at what Kelly has said about his run game, it's not that complicated. He even says "it's not a read." Just hand the ball off, every time, unless the DE (or scraping LB) gives you absolutely no choice.
As a final point, we should be explicit about the ground we're fighting on here. You're saying "replace Vick immediately" and I'm saying "replace Vick as soon as you can possibly get someone better." By the time the draft is done, there may no longer be any space between our positions.

This is a really fun time to be an Eagles fan, if only because after years of run-pass ratio, red zone performance and we're-really-hiring-whom? all the current arguments are New! and Fresh! and Exciting! Official IgglesBlog beat writer (it's a lifetime award) Les Bowen gave his take on the Vick...

Dixon is here, so that's covered. If he's better than Vick, he'll play.
As for Smith, it's the same thing as above -- he's better, but he's not free. San Francisco isn't just going to give him away. Anything we trade in return takes away from resources we could use to address other needs. Why do that for a stopgap when you have a stopgap already?
As for "teaching other players in the offense," that's not his role. Again, you're tied up in looking at this from Vick's perspective. Break away from that for a minute.
Foles *can't* run the read option. He's too slow. Defenses will just crash on the back and then if he keeps it -- which he should, every time, if he's reading correctly -- they'll just run him down and demolish him before he even gets to the line.
Vick may or may not be able to run the read option *well*, but he *can* run it. You have to play him straight or else he will get the corner on you.
Will he run 60 yards and score a touchdown? No, not anymore. But he at least gives:
* Kelly the chance to see how his concepts work at this level.
* Everyone else on the offense a chance to practice the things they'll be doing going forward with the new QB.
I'm arguing, in effect, that this one qualitative difference mitigates whatever other quantitative differences may or may not exist between the two players.

This is a really fun time to be an Eagles fan, if only because after years of run-pass ratio, red zone performance and we're-really-hiring-whom? all the current arguments are New! and Fresh! and Exciting! Official IgglesBlog beat writer (it's a lifetime award) Les Bowen gave his take on the Vick...

And the point argued above is that all of these things can be true, but it's still better to run with Vick, because the unit of analysis is the *other* 10 guys, not the quarterback.
Will *their* performance running Chip Kelly's offense in 2014-? with Future Unnamed QB be better or worse if they spend 2013 playing with:
1) A better QB (for same of argument) who can't actually run Kelly's offense.
2) A lesser QB (for sake of argument) who can run the offense and therefore give people live reps.
Also, let's not assume Vick is the final answer. We still have a draft and free agency to go.
Finally, when talking about cost, even just cutting Vick was going to be expensive against this year's cap:
http://web.archive.org/web/20130203011502/http://eaglescap.com/Players/MichaelVick.html
If the reports of the new deal are to be believed, he's basically costing us the same ~$7M cap hit this year but at least we get to keep him in the mix -- and he's now tradable.
There were a few different pieces of this decision that need to be considered together.

This is a really fun time to be an Eagles fan, if only because after years of run-pass ratio, red zone performance and we're-really-hiring-whom? all the current arguments are New! and Fresh! and Exciting! Official IgglesBlog beat writer (it's a lifetime award) Les Bowen gave his take on the Vick...